The present invention relates in general to ice making, and more particularly to an automatic ice cube maker for use in the freezer compartment of a domestic refrigerator.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,142,373; 4,142,377 and 4,142,378, all owned by the assignee of the present invention and incorporated by reference herein in their entireties, illustrate a prior art automatic ice cube maker of the particular type to which the present invention is directed.
Such a prior art automatic ice maker includes a housing having a generally open top and bottom defined by a front wall, a rear wall, and a pair of opposed sidewalls. A rectangular, flexible plastic ice tray has a top side providing a plurality of ice cube shaped pockets for receiving from a fill tube located above the ice tray, water to be frozen into ice cubes. The rectangular ice tray is pivotally mounted at its ends between the front and rear housing walls for rotary movement on a horizontal axis. An electric motor, through a reduction gear type transmission, moves the ice tray between an upright ice making position and an inverted ice dumping position. When the ice tray moves to its inverted ice dumping position, ice cubes are dislodged by limited twisting of the flexible tray, and then fall from the ice tray into an underlying, open top, ice cube storage bin. The ice cubes in the bin can be manually removed, or can be automatically dispensed through the closed door of the freezer compartment via a through-the-door ice dispenser is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,220,266, also owned by the assignee of the present invention. An example of an ice cube storage bin for use with an automatic through-the-door ice dispenser is illustrated by U.S. Pat. No. 3,887,119, also owned by the assignee of the present invention.
An electronic control circuit regulates the operation of the electric motor driving the ice tray. The control circuit is responsive to a probelike sensor monitoring the temperature of a selected one of the ice cube pockets in the ice tray. The control circuit is also responsive to the position of a movable ice level sensing arm or bail that swings downwardly into the open top of the storage bin to monitor the level of ice cubes accumulated therein. When the ice level in the bin holds the movable bail at a predetermined raised position indicative of a desired maximum ice level, the control circuit inhibits movement of the ice tray to its inverted ice dumping position so as to avoid overfilling of the ice storage bin. The noted prior art ice maker also includes a torsion spring rod mechanism that automatically moves the bail to its raised, ice dump inhibiting position when the storage bin is temporarily removed from the freezer compartment, thus precluding ice dumping during the time period that the bin is removed.
Although the noted prior art ice maker represents a significant advancement in the art, it has been found to be relatively costly to manufacture. Also, it is relatively complex, thus leading to reliability and maintenance problems. These disadvantages are especially significant due to the highly competitive nature of the domestic appliance industry where cost and long term reliability are of paramount concern.
It would be desirable to provide an improved automatic ice maker of the subject type but of simpler, lower cost construction, while not forfeiting any benefits of prior art devices. Further, such an improved ice maker design should, to the extent possible, facilitate serviceability of the ice maker so as to minimize maintenance costs.